Reck House Press

Who and where we are; what we publish

The Reck House Press is a small publisher of quality nonfiction and fiction located along the shores of the Kennebec River near the Doubling Point Light at Fiddler's Reach and Winnegance Bay, in Bath, Maine.

Our interests are fiction and popular and cultural history (including memoirs, letters, journals, and biographies), which we offer through our Sidebar Historian® series.

We regret that we have to close the window on new fiction queries until we work through the queries and submissions currently in house. We are, however, still soliciting popular and cultural history manuscripts. Before you submit even a query, please review our Frequently Asked Questions/Submission Guidelines.

Getting around the Reck House Press website

If you hover your mouse above a typewriter key on the navigation bar (at the top of each page, right under our Reck House Press banner and logo), you'll see the title of page associated with that icon. Or visit our sitemap to see how these webpages are organized.

Mi'kmaq Sun. John Prescott Heald's debut novel has been published. You can order it through us , selected independent bookstores, or Amazon.
The story involves a young Mi'kmaq Indian smuggler and the AFT agent who pursues him - both of whom both fear that the Mi'kmaq's father, long presumed dead, has resurfaced and killed a child. Early reviewers have been very impressed with the book. And since several people have asked about the handsome lass that graces the book's webpage we want to give a shout out to Bandit, lead dog at Blockhouse Pursuits Dogsled Adventures.

Landscape with Trees.We are delighted to announce the publication of Johanna Fox's first novel, Landscape with Trees. Marie Cameron, having left her husband, is then immediately left by her lover. The novel follows her through several months of devastation, discovery, recognition, and rediscovery in the Maine landscape of her childhood. Reck House will also be releasing Johanna's Learning to Drown in early 2015.

From the It's All Good News Department: Much as we love books of paper pulp, we're moving into electronic books as well. We expect that some of our forthcoming titles will be issued only as multi-platformed eBooks, and, beginning in 2014, many of our previously published print books will also be offered as eBooks.

Querying Reck House Press about your manuscript

Because so many of the queries we have received recently have been incomplete, and because we really don't want to reject your query just because you've not given us enough information on which to make an informed decision, we've expanded our submission guidelines. We revise these continually so please check frequently, and certainly just before you submit! Review the guidelines carefully, and delay your query until you can answer all applicable questions on the query form (and remember that questions about reader outreach are applicable to all queries).

We've also expanded our guidance for synopses and first-chapter submissions. That's also reachable from the FAQ page.

We have a special form for queries, and cannot consider queries that reach us through any other channel.

Ordering Reck House Press publications

PRE-PUBLICATION ORDERS: Once we announce the publication date for a book and post a definitive price on our website, we will accept advance orders for it. To place an order in advance of publication, look for the "Add to Cart" button at the bottom of that book's page. You can order (through PayPal, or with a credit card) by clicking through to a very secure website from the "Add to Cart" button. Please see our order page for more information.

ORDERING PUBLISHED TITLES: Again, you can order directly from us by following the above directions (you're already here, after all!). Our books are also available through those local bookstores or library that use distribution channels set up by Baker & Taylor, Barnes & Noble, Ingram, Amazon, or EBM (Expresso Book Machine).

Permissions to quote from Reck House Press

Reck House publications and its website enjoy copyright protection, with all rights reserved. Excepting brief excerpts for critical reviews, no part of a Reck House publication or the press website may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the express written permission of Reck House Press. Please contact the Reck House Press staff for a permissions request form.

The Reck House Press staff

Our editor-in-chief has been working professionally in the publishing field for more than twenty-five years and brings to the press a lifetime of reading, writing, and thinking about fiction and creative nonfiction. Work with the writers' groups she has coordinated and with the clients of her business, Rockfall Editorial Services, has sharpened her enthusiasm for the well-chosen word in the most suitable setting.

Our creative director adds an avid interest in cultural history to her twenty-year design and communication background, and has published several books of fiction and nonfiction.

Contacting Reck House Press

Please use our query form when submitting work for our consideration. We cannot respond to queries that arrive in any other fashion.

Would you like to be added to the Reck House Press mailing list?

Before you say, Good grief, NO!!! please understand that we hate being inundated with junk email as much as you do, and so we respectfully pledge to contact you only when we are announcing a title that might be of interest to you, or a publication party or reading in your area.

And of course, we never, ever sell or share our mailing list, and – while we'll hate to see you go – you can ask to be removed from the list at any time and we'll comply quickly, albeit with heavy heart.

You can use our contact form to be added to our mailing list. And this might be a good time to reassure you once more by drawing your attention to our Privacy Policy.